Judge about nomadic life we can from records in ancient sources. For the people of that time, nomads posed a threat. A huge contrast arises between settled agriculture and nomadic cattle breeding. But despite this, trade and cultural ties existed. It is also a misconception that nomadic cattle breeding is more primitive than agriculture. But cattle breeding appeared already when people learned to cultivate the land. It requires the same ability to use climatic conditions as does agriculture.

Sedentary people needed political stability and a familiar climate. Natural disasters and warriors destroyed crops in the fields. For example, the economies of Rome and Greece were based on agriculture, and then on trade.

The life of nomadic peoples did not leave stone buildings, laws and books. It is difficult for us to judge the stages of cultural development. The steppe did not find understanding among sedentary peoples. Nomadic peoples did not pay much attention to worldly things; they did not cultivate the land or build houses. The steppe people were wanderers in the earthly world, making a long journey.

Who are the nomads? There were several types of nomadic peoples. Generally speaking, these are people who followed a herd of animals in order to find water and food. A nomad lives with a herd all year round and periodically makes treks to feed the livestock. They do not have a route or seasonal camps. Nomadic peoples cannot have a permanent state. They are gathered into clans (several families), which are headed by chiefs. The tribes are not closely related, but people can move from one to another without difficulty.

The life of a nomad revolves around animals: goats, camels, yaks, horses and cattle.

The Sarmatians and Scythians occupied a territory without borders and were semi-nomadic or nomadic image life. But they had the concept of invading their lands. Specific winter and summer camps there wasn't. However, they identified the area most favorable for grazing in winter and summer.

Herodotus once described Darius's attempt to conquer the Scythians. But the Scythians did not accept the battle: “We do not run out of fear. We do the same as in everyday life. We do not engage in battles - we do not have cultivated lands and cities. We are not afraid of their devastation and ruin. There is no need for an immediate battle,” replied the Scythian kings. He understood that someday the Persians would leave without conquering the steppe.

Sedentary peoples on the border with the steppe practiced animal husbandry as a complement to agriculture. However, true pastoralists survive from their herds and hunting.

The nomads did not lead a sedentary lifestyle. They exchanged animals for grain, textiles and handicrafts from the settled part of the population. The pride of many nomads was high-quality weapons and luxury goods. For example, the Scythians greatly valued wine from the Greek Black Sea colonies. They exchanged it for slaves, animal skins and other things. Strabo describes one of the trading cities of Tanais in the Greek colony: “The market was familiar to European traders. There were both Asian and European nomads there. Some came from Bosporus. The nomads sold their goods and in return bought the fruits of other civilizations - wine, clothing, etc.”

Trade relations were an important part of the lives of both sides. For her sake, nomadic tribes and Europeans entered into peace agreements. For example, the Huns, after devastating escapes to Europe, entered into a peace agreement with Rome to be able to trade.

IN this section books about nomads have been collected. The main type of economic activity of the nomads was extensive cattle breeding. In search of new pastures, nomadic tribes regularly moved to new places. Nomads are distinguished by a special material culture and the worldview of steppe societies.

Scythians

The Scythians are one of the most powerful nomadic peoples of antiquity. There are many versions of the origin of this tribal union; many ancient historians seriously connected the origin of the Scythians with the Greek gods. The Scythians themselves considered the children and grandchildren of Zeus to be their ancestors. During their reign, golden tools fell from heaven to the earth: a yoke, a plow, an ax and a bowl. The man who managed to take the objects in his hands without getting burned became the founder of a new kingdom.

Rise of the kingdom

The heyday of the Scythian kingdom falls on the V-IV centuries. B.C. At first it was simply a union of several tribes, but soon the hierarchy began to resemble an early state formation, which had its own capital and signs of the emergence of social classes. During its heyday, the Scythian kingdom occupied a huge territory. Starting from the Danube delta, all the steppes and forest-steppes down to the lower reaches of the Don belonged to this people. During the reign of the most famous Scythian king Atey, the capital of the state was in the Lower Dnieper region, more precisely in the Kamensky Settlement. This is the largest settlement, which was both a city and a nomadic camp. Earthen barricades and other fortifications could shelter tens of thousands of slave artisans and shepherds from enemies. If necessary, shelter was also provided to livestock.
Scythian culture is very closely intertwined with Greek. Representatives of this people liked to decorate their weapons with images of real and mythical animals. Their own traditions of inventive and applied art were very rich, but the ruling kings and representatives of the nobility massively ordered weapons, jewelry and dishes from the masters of Panticapaeum and Olbia. Great attention was also paid to the study of the Greek language and writing. Architectural style Scythian Naples and its defensive structures are thoroughly permeated with the Greek spirit. You can feel it even when we're talking about about the labyrinths of huts and dugouts where the poor Scythians lived.

Religion

The religious views of the Scythians were limited to the worship of the elements. The goddess of fire, Vesta, was given primacy when pronouncing oaths, communion ceremonies and anointing of the leaders of the people. Clay figurines depicting this goddess have survived to this day. Archaeologists designate the location of such artifacts as the area between the Ural Mountains and the Dnieper River. There were similar finds in Crimea. The Scythians depicted Vesta with a baby in her arms, because for them she personified motherhood. There are artifacts in which Vesta is depicted in the form of a snake woman. The cult of Vesta was also widespread in Greece, but the Greeks considered her the patroness of sailors.
In addition to the main deity, the Scythians worshiped Jupiter, Apollo, Venus, and Neptune. Every hundredth captive was sacrificed to these gods. However, the Scythians did not have a specific place for religious ceremonies. Instead of shrines and temples, they lavished reverence on the graves of their loved ones. Of course, their care and vigilance could not stop the robbers who desecrated the mounds after the funeral. There is hardly a grave like this left untouched.

Hierarchy
The structure of the Scythian tribal association was multi-level. At the top of such a pyramid were the Sayi - the Royal Scythians, they ruled over their other relatives. Since the 7th century. BC The Steppe Crimea came under the influence of the Scythians. The local people submitted to the conquerors. Scythia was so powerful that no one, not even the Persian king Darius, could prevent the founding of new Greek colonies on their lands. But the benefits of such a neighborhood were obvious. Olbia and the cities of the Bosporan kingdom conducted active trade with the Scythians, and, apparently, they collected tribute and could influence the political situation. This fact was confirmed by the Kul-Oba mound of the 4th century. BC, which was excavated near Kerch in 1830. For an unknown reason, the warrior buried under this mound was not taken to the burial place of the Scythian nobility, while it is obvious that the entire Panticapaeum took part in the funeral procession.

Migrations and wars
At first, the territory of Southwestern Crimea was of little interest to the Scythians. The Chersonese state was just beginning to emerge when the Scythians began to be gradually pressed out by the Sarmatians, Macedonians and Thracians. They advanced from the east and west, forcing the Scythian kingdom to “shrink.” Soon, only the lands of the Steppe Crimea and the Lower Dnieper region remained under the rule of the Scythian kings. The capital of the kingdom was moved to a new city - Scythian Naples. Since then, the authority of the Scythians has been lost. They were forced to coexist with new neighbors.
Over time, the Crimean Scythians, who settled in the foothills, began to make the transition from nomadic to sedentary life. Cattle breeding gave way to agriculture. The excellent Crimean wheat was in demand on the world market, so the rulers of Scythia in every possible way encouraged and forced their people to popularize agriculture. The neighbors of the Scythians, the kings of the Bosporus, received large profits from the sale of exported grain grown by Scythian labor. The kings of Scythia also wanted to receive their share of the income, but for this they needed their own ports and new lands. After several unsuccessful attempts to fight the powerful people of the Bosporus in the 6th-5th centuries. BC, the Scythians turned their gaze in the opposite direction, to where Chersonesos grew and flourished. However, the development of new territory did not save the Scythians from defeat. The Sarmatians dealt a fatal blow to the weakened kingdom. These events date back to 300 BC. The Scythian kingdom fell under the onslaught of conquerors.

Sarmatians

Scientists believe that the Sarmatians descended from the descendants of two cultures, Srubnaya and Andronovo. The beginning of our era and the first millennium BC were marked by the widespread settlement of the Scythian and Sarmatian tribes along the Great Steppe. They belonged to the northern Iranian peoples, along with the Asian Sakas and European Scythians. In antiquity, it was believed that the Sarmatians were descended from the Amazons, whose husbands were Scythian men. However, for these women the Scythian language turned out to be difficult, and they could not master it, and the Sarmatian language is a distorted Scythian. In particular, this was the opinion of Herodotus.

In the 3rd century BC, Scythian power weakened, and the Sarmatians occupied a dominant position in the Black Sea region. A large period of our country’s history is connected with them.
Zabelin believed that the peoples whom the Greeks and Romans called Sarmatians were in reality Slavs. In the territories of the Northern Black Sea region, the Sarmatians were engaged in raising livestock, their lifestyle was nomadic, they wandered closed for a year along a specific route, choosing places with good pastures. Their farm included sheep, small horses, and cattle. They also hunted, together with women who were not inferior to their men in horse riding and archery.
They lived in felt tents that were mounted on carts, and their main food was milk, cheese, meat, and millet porridge. The Sarmatians dressed almost the same as the Scythians. Women wore long clothes, with a belt and long trousers. Their headdress was a hood pointed at the end.

Religion of the Sarmatians

In the religious and cult representation of the Sarmatians, images of animals, in particular the ram, occupied a special place. The image of a ram was often applied to the handles of swords or drinking vessels. The image of a ram was personified with “heavenly grace” and was a symbol among many peoples of antiquity. And also the Sarmatians had a very strong cult of their ancestors.
The religious syncretism of the Greco-Iranian tribes found its embodiment in Aphrodite-Aputara, or the deceiver, this is the cult of the goddess of the ancient Greco-Sarmatians. She was considered the goddess of fertility and was the patroness of horses. The sanctuary of this goddess was in Taman, there is a place called Aputara there, but whether it was in Panticapaeum is not known for sure. The cult of the goddess Astarte, revered in Asia, has much in common, almost related, with the cult of Aphrodite-Aputara. The Sarmatians worshiped the cult of fire and the sun; the guardians of this cult were selected priestesses.

The sword was also an object of cult of the Sarmatians; it personified the god of war. According to historians, the sword was stuck into the ground and worshiped with reverence.
From the Sarmatians, during their entire thousand-year stay, only a few reminders remained, monuments, huge mounds up to 5-7 meters in height. Sarmatian and Sauromatian mounds usually form groups where the terrain is quite high. As a rule, on high hills, an immense steppe panorama opens from them. They are noticeable from afar and attract treasure hunters and robbers of all stripes.
These tribes did not disappear without a trace for the South of Russia. From them the names of rivers remained, such as the Dniester, Dnieper, Don. The names of these rivers and numerous small rivulets are translations from the Sarmatian language.

Social structure

The Sarmatians had quite a variety of household items, which only indicates that their crafts were well developed. They cast bronze products, were engaged in blacksmithing, leatherworking and woodworking were also developed. The Sarmatians moved west, and to do this they had to conquer territories.
Since the Sarmatians were constantly at war, the power of the leader, or “king,” increased, since he was the center of grouping of the military squad. However, the clan system that they jealously guarded prevented the creation of a single, integral state.
The main difference between the Sarmatian social system was the remnants of matriarchy, this was especially noticeable in the early stages of the development of Sarmatian society. Some ancient authors considered the Sarmatians to be woman-governing, since women participated in wars on an equal basis with men.

Art was developed. Things were artistically decorated with semiprecious stones, glass, enamel, and then framed with filigree patterns.
When the Sarmatians came to Crimea, they changed the composition of the indigenous population and brought their ethnicity there. They also entered the ruling dynasties of Bosporus, ancient culture At the same time, it became sarmatized. Their influence on social life, the economy, and clothing is also enormous; they distributed their weapons and taught the local population new methods of war.

Military affairs

War was the main industry of the Sarmatians, as well as of other barbarian tribes. Large cavalry detachments of Sarmatian warriors terrified the neighboring states and the peoples inhabiting them. The horsemen were well armed and protected, they already had armor and chain mail, iron long swords, bows, they wore bows and their arrows were poisoned with snake venom. Their heads were protected by helmets made of ox skin and armor made of twigs.
Their sword, up to 110 cm long, became a popular weapon, as its advantage in battle was obvious. The Sarmatians practically did not fight on foot; it was they who created the heavy cavalry. They fought with two horses, to give one a rest, they changed to the second. Sometimes they brought three horses with them.
Their military art was at a very high level of development for that time, since almost from birth they learned horse riding, trained constantly and worshiped the sword.
They were extremely serious opponents, very dexterous warriors, they tried to avoid open war, throwing arrows as well, but they were excellent robbers.

Migrations

The population of the Sarmatians grew, the number of livestock increased, and therefore the movements of the Sarmatians expanded. Not too much time passed, and they occupied and settled a vast territory between the Dnieper and Tobol, until North Caucasus in the south. The Huns and other tribes began to press them from the East, and in the 4th century the Sarmatians went west, where they reached the Roman Empire, the Iberian Peninsula and crossed into North Africa. There they assimilated with other peoples.
No matter how large the territory they inhabited, the southern Ural and northern Kazakhstan steppes were best inhabited by them. Over one hundred and fifty mounds have been found along the banks of one river alone, the Ilek, and in its lower and middle reaches.
The Sarmatians came to the lower reaches of the Manych River and began to spread throughout the Kuban, where their influence was strong. At the end of the 4th century, the settlement of the Sarmatians in Stavropol intensified, they partially exterminated the local population, and partially displaced them. Due to this, the military potential of the indigenous population was lost.
The Sarmatians have always migrated very aggressively, capturing new territories in the process. They were able to reach Eastern Europe, settling in the territory of the Middle Danube. They also penetrated into North Ossetia, there are numerous monuments of their culture, and the origin of the Ossetians is associated with the Sarmatians, they are considered their descendants.
Although the Sarmatians lagged behind the Scythians in the development of their society, they went through the decomposition of the tribal system. And the leaders, supported by a military squad represented by the nobility, became the heads of the tribes.

Huns

The Huns are an Iranian-speaking group of peoples formed in the 2nd century. According to scientists, their tribes led a nomadic lifestyle. They became famous for their military actions and it was they who invented one of the best weapons of that time. The most striking events in the life of this tribal union took place from the 2nd to the 5th centuries.
In the history of the life of such a people as the Huns, there are many blank spots. Historians of those times and today described the life and military exploits of the Huns. However, their historical accounts are often unreliable because they lack scientific evidence. Moreover, these data are highly contradictory.
An Iranian-speaking people was formed by mixing Eurasian tribes, peoples of the Volga region and the Urals. The Huns began their nomadic path from the Chinese borders and gradually moved to European territories. There is a version that the roots of these tribes should be sought in Northern China. They slowly, sweeping away everything in their path, headed northeast.

Lifestyle

Nomadic tribes, without permanent housing, moved across vast steppe territories, carrying all their belongings in wagons. They drove the cattle behind them. Their main activity is raiding and cattle breeding.
Spending the night in the open air and eating fried or raw meat, over time they became strong and hardened. They kept raw meat under the saddle during the campaign to soften it. Roots and berries collected in the steppes or forests were often eaten. Wives with children and old people moved in wagons along with the entire tribe. WITH early childhood boys were trained in martial arts and horse riding. By the time they reached adolescence, the boys became real warriors.
The clothing of a representative of these peoples was the skin of an animal, in which a slit was torn, after which it was put on over the head, around the neck and worn until it was torn into shreds and flew off. There was usually a fur hat on the head, and the legs were wrapped in animal skins, usually goat skins.

Inconvenient improvised shoes hindered walking, so the Huns practically did not move on foot, and it was generally impossible for them to conduct a foot battle. But they had perfect riding skills and therefore spent all their time in the saddle. They even conducted negotiations and trade deals without getting off the horse.
They did not build any housing, not even primitive huts. Only the very rich and influential members of the tribe had beautiful wooden houses.
By seizing territories, enslaving and imposing tribute on local peoples, the Huns introduced significant changes to culture, language and traditions.
When a boy was born into the Huns' family, cuts were made on his face immediately after birth so that hair would not grow later. Therefore, even in old age they are beardless. The men walked with slouches. They allowed themselves to have several wives.
The Huns worshiped the moon and the sun. And every spring they made sacrifices to the spirits of their ancestors. They also believed in an afterlife and believed that their stay on earth was just part of an immortal life.

From China to Europe

Originating in northern China, the barbarian tribes of the Huns set out to conquer new territories in the northeast. They were not interested in fertile lands, since they had never engaged in agriculture, they were not interested in territories for the construction of new cities, they were exclusively interested in mining.
Carrying out raids on the settlements of Scythian tribes, they took away food, clothing, livestock, and jewelry. Scythian women were brutally raped and men were killed with cruelty.
By the 5th century, the Huns were firmly established in European territories, their main occupation was raids and wars. Their weapons, made of bones, terrified those around them. They invented the most powerful bows at that time and fired whistling bullets. The famous long-range bow, which terrified enemies, was more than one and a half meters long. Components Animal horns and bones served as formidable weapons.
They rushed into battle with fearlessness and with a terrible scream that frightened everyone. The army marched in the form of a wedge, but at the right moment, on command, everyone could change formation.

The best period for the union of tribes, which included the Huns, Bulgars and the Germanic and Slavic tribes, occurred during the reign of Attila. This was a leader who was feared by both his enemies and the Huns themselves. To gain power, he insidiously killed his own brother. In European countries he was nicknamed “The Scourge of God.”
He was a wise leader and was able to win battles with the Romans. He managed to force the Byzantine Empire to pay tribute. The Huns entered into a military alliance with the Romans and helped them capture territories that belonged to the Germanic tribes.
Later, Attila's army entered into battle with the Roman army. Historians called this battle “the duel of light and darkness.” The bloody battle lasted for seven days, resulting in the death of 165,000 soldiers. The army of the Huns was defeated, but a year later Attila gathered and led a new army to Italy.
According to one version, Attila was killed during his next wedding. He was killed by his young wife, the daughter of one of the German leaders. Thus, she took revenge for her tribe. He was found after the feast, bleeding.
The legendary leader was buried at the bottom of the Tisza River. He was buried in a triple coffin made of gold, silver and iron. According to tradition, his weapons and jewelry were placed in the coffin. The leader was buried at night in order to keep the burial place secret. Everyone who participated in the funeral process was later also killed. The burial place of the formidable warrior is still unknown.
After the death of Attila, the Hunnic military leaders began to quarrel among themselves and could no longer maintain power over other tribes. At this moment, the collapse of the powerful tribal union began, which later led to the extinction of the Huns as a people. Those who remained from the tribe mixed with other nomadic peoples.
Later, the term “Huns” was used to describe all barbarians found on the territory of European states.
To this day, it remains a mystery where the treasures looted by the Huns over such a long period of time went. According to legend, they are located at the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea in a mysterious place called Bibione. Scuba divers and archaeologists conducted expeditions and research, they found various interesting finds, but nothing indicates that they belonged specifically to the Huns. Bibione himself was also not found.
The period of history associated with the Huns tribes contains many mysteries, legends, and legends. Uneducated nomads kept states from China to Italy at bay. Entire settlements suffered at their hands civilians. They terrified even the brave warriors of the Roman Empire. But with the death of Attila, the era of barbaric attacks by the Huns was over.

Tatars

Tatars are the second largest ethnic group in Russia and the most numerous people Muslim culture in the country. Tatar peoples have very ancient history, which is closely connected with the history of the peoples of the Ural-Volga region. And, at the same time, there is not much documented and truthful information on the history of the emergence of this people. Events in the distant V-XIII centuries were so intertwined that it is very difficult to separate the history of the Tatar peoples from the history of the Turkic tribes, with whom they lived together for a long time on the territory of the Mongolian steppe.

The ethnonym “Tatars” has been known since about the 5th century. In Chinese, this name sounded “ta-ta” or “da-da.” Tatar tribes lived in those days in the northeastern part of Mongolia and in some territories of Manchuria. For the Chinese, the name of these nationalities meant “dirty”, “barbarian”. The Tatars themselves most likely called themselves “pleasant people.” The most famous tribal union of the ancient Tatars is considered to be “Otuz-Tatars” - “Thirty Tatars”, which later became the union “Tokuz Tatars” - “Nine Tatars”. These names are mentioned in the Turkic chronicle from the time of the Second Turkic Khaganate (mid-8th century). The Tatar tribes, like the Turkic ones, quite successfully settled throughout Siberia. And in the 11th century, the famous Turkic researcher Mahmud of Kashgar calls the large territory between the Northern regions of China and Eastern Turkestan nothing less than the “Tatar steppe”. In subsequent works, scientists of that time indicate the following Tatar tribes: Dorben-Tatars, Oboi Tatars, Ayriud-Buyruud. And by the middle of the 12th century, the Tatars became one of the most powerful tribal formations in Mongolia. In the 70s of the 12th century, the Tatar unification defeated the Mongol army and after that the Chinese called all nomads “da-dan” (that is, Tatars), regardless of their ethnicity.

Wars and migrations

The life of the Tatar tribes was never calm and was always accompanied by military battles. The Chinese were afraid of the Tatars and took all sorts of preventive measures. According to some chronicles, they sought to reduce the number of adult Tatars, for which purpose every three years the Chinese went to war against the Tatar tribes. In addition, internecine clashes periodically broke out, as well as local wars between the Tatars and Mongols. The creation of the Great Turkic Khaganate played a major role in the history of the Tatars, as well as all the nationalities of this region. This powerful entity controlled a vast territory from Altai to Crimea. But at the beginning of the 7th century it split into two parts - Western and Eastern, and in the middle of the 8th century it completely collapsed. It is known that in some battles the Turkic troops also included numerous Tatar detachments. After the fall of the Eastern Kaganate, some Tatar tribes submitted to the Uighurs and subsequently entered into an alliance with the Turkic Khitans; part of the tribe went west to the Irtysh region and took a leading role in the formation of the Kimak Kaganate, on the basis of which the Kazakh and Siberian Tatar peoples later formed.

The history of these kaganates was also not long. The Uyghur Khaganate was defeated by the Kyrgyz in 842, and some time later the Tatars created many states and tribal associations in the southeastern regions of Siberia and in the territory of Northern China east of East Turkestan, which allowed Muslim historians to call this region Dasht-i Tatars or " Tatar steppe". These were powerful associations that controlled part of the Great Silk Road and pursued an active foreign policy in Central Asia. But in the thirties, numerous Tatar principalities were conquered by the state of the Karakitaev (Western Khitans). Thirty years later, the Tatar troops completely defeated the Mongols, and at the end of the century they went to war with China. The Chinese were much stronger, and the defeated remnants of the Tatar tribes were forced to move away from the Chinese borders. The second misfortune for the Tatars was the reign of Genghis Khan, who in 1196 defeated their army, and in 1202, after the Tatar uprising, he destroyed the entire adult Tatar population as punishment.

The Kimak Khaganate existed in the territories of Kazakhstan and Southern Siberia until the thirties of the 12th century. The forces of the Kaganate captured more and more lands, displacing local tribes in different directions, which became the reason for the large migration of Tatar tribes across the territory of Eurasia. After the fall of the Kimaks, power passed to the unification of the Kipchaks, who began to move further to the west. Tatar tribes went with them.

System of government

Like many Turkic peoples, the Tatars had the institution of electing the supreme ruler (tenrikot). Many demands were placed on him. He had to be smart, fair, brave and honest. The chosen leader had to resemble the supreme Turkic deity - Tenri (god of the sky). It was not thought that this leader would enrich himself at the expense of his people. On the contrary, it was assumed that he should be a fair representative of the interests of all segments of the population, including conquered peoples. The doctrine of power in Tatar society was determined by the Mandate of Heaven and the ruler had to earn this mandate every time with his virtue. If the ruler’s entourage understood that he was no longer virtuous enough, he could be re-elected. As a rule, a successful assassination attempt has always been the most successful way to get re-elected.

In subsequent formations (khaganates), power began to be inherited, and the kagans received the right to specific ownership of lands. Other high-ranking people in the kaganates also owned appanage lands. They were obliged to field a certain number of warriors in battle and monitor the implementation of laws in their subject territory. Like most Turkic tribes, the Tatars had a strict hierarchy of clans and tribes as the fundamental principle of social and government structure. In addition, the use of slave labor (usually female slaves) in the household was widely practiced. Captured captives participated in grazing livestock, stockpiling feed and other work. If a man was captured, he was most likely sold to China.
Historians classify the social structure of the Central Asian states of that time in different ways. This is a military democracy, a tribal state, and a patriarchal-feudal state formation. The last kaganates (for example, Kimak) are already called early feudal society. The main type of economy of all these associations was nomadic cattle breeding. The settling tribes were already engaged in agriculture - they grew barley, wheat, and in some places rice. The nationalities also developed crafts - leatherworking, metallurgy, construction technologies, and jewelry.

Religious canons

Since ancient times, Tengrism, the doctrine of the God of Heaven, who ruled over everyone, has been extremely widespread in the Turkic environment. Pagan beliefs about totems were widely known - animals that stood at the origin of the Tatar peoples and were their patrons. The resulting associations - the Khaganates (and subsequently the Golden Horde) were multi-confessional states where no one was forced to change their faith. But the Tatar tribes, coming into contact with other peoples, inevitably came to a change in beliefs. Thus, the Uighurs (and the Tatars living on the territory of their principalities) adopted Islam from Khorezm. The Tatars of East Turkestan partially adopted Buddhism, partially Manichaeism and Islam. Genghis Khan became a great reformer in this area, who separated the state from religion and removed the chief shaman from power, proclaiming equal rights for all faiths. And in the 14th century, Uzbek Khan recognized Islam as the main state ideology, which many historians recognize as the reason for the collapse of the Golden Horde. Now the traditional religion of the Tatars is Sunni Islam.

Mongols

The homeland of the Mongols is considered to be a territory located northwest and north of China, in a region called Central Asia. These cold, arid plateaus, crisscrossed by eroded, eroded mountain ranges north of the Siberian taiga and along the Chinese border, are the barren, barren steppe and desert where the Mongol nation was born.

Birth of the Mongolian nation

The foundation of the future Mongol state was laid at the beginning of the 12th century; during this period, several tribes were consolidated by the leader Kaidu. Subsequently, his grandson Kabul established relations with the leadership of Northern China, which first developed on the basis of vassalage, and after the end of a short war, as the recipient of a minor tribute. However, his successor Ambakai was handed over by the Tatars to the Chinese, who did not fail to deal with him, after which the reins of power passed to Kutula, who was defeated by the Chinese in 1161 and entered into an alliance with the Tatars. The Tatars, a few years later, killed Yesugai, the father of Temujin, who gathered all the Mongols around him and conquered the world under the name of Genghis Khan. It was these events that became the catalyst for the consolidation of several nomadic tribes into one nation called the Mongols, the mere mention of which made the rulers of the medieval world tremble.

Social structure of the Mongols

Until the beginning of the 13th century, marked by the great conquests of the Mongols led by Genghis Khan, Mongol nomads in the steppes were engaged in herding sheep, cows, goats and ever-increasing herds of horses. In the arid regions, the Mongols bred camels, but in the lands located closer to the Siberian taiga, there were tribes that lived in the forests and hunted. The taiga tribes treated shamans with special reverence, who occupied a central and key place in their social structure.
The Mongol tribes were characterized by a structured social hierarchy, at the head of which stood the nobility, who bore the titles of noyons, princes, and bahadurs. They were subordinated to the less noble nobility, who were followed in the hierarchy by ordinary nomads, individual captives, as well as conquered tribes who were in the service of the victors. Estates were divided into clans, which were part of the looser structure of the tribe. The affairs of clans and tribes were discussed at kurultai, where the khan was elected by the nobility. He was elected for a limited period and had to solve certain strategic problems, for example, plan the conduct of a war. His power was limited, while the nobility really ruled everything, this state of affairs contributed to the formation of short-lived confederations, this led to constant anarchy in the ranks of the Mongols, which only Genghis Khan managed to cope with.

Religious beliefs of the Mongols

The religion of the Mongols was of the shamanic type. Shamanism was widespread among northern nomads and other peoples of North Asia. They did not have a developed philosophy, dogma and theology, and therefore shamanism was not recognized by Muslims, Christians and Jews. To gain the right to exist, shamanism had to adapt to the most superstitious forms of Christianity, such as Nestorianism, widespread in Central Asia. In the Mongolian language, a shaman was called kam, he was a sorcerer, healer and fortuneteller; according to the beliefs of the Mongols, he was a mediator between the world of the living and the dead, people and spirits. The Mongols sincerely believed in the nature of countless spirits, which included their ancestors. For each natural object and phenomenon they had their own spirit, this concerned the spirits of the earth, water, plants, sky, and it was these spirits, according to their beliefs, that determined human life.

Spirits in the Mongolian religion had a strict hierarchy, the heavenly spirit Tengri was considered supreme among them, and it was with him that the supreme leaders were related, serving him faithfully. According to the beliefs of the Mongols, Tengri and other spirits expressed their will in prophetic dreams, during rituals and in visions. If necessity required this, they revealed their will directly to the ruler.

Despite the fact that Tengri punished and thanked his followers, in everyday life ordinary Mongols did not perform any special rituals dedicated to him. A little later, when Chinese influence became noticeable, the Mongols began to decorate tablets with his name on them, fumigating them with incense. Much closer to the people and their daily affairs stood the goddess Nachigai, also called Etugen. She was the mistress of grass, herds and harvests; it was with her image that all homes were decorated and prayers were made for good weather, a large harvest, more herds and family prosperity. The Mongols addressed all their prayers to ongons; these were unique idols made by women from silk, felt and other materials.

Wars of the Mongols before the era of Genghis Khan
Until the 13th century, little was known about the Mongol tribes; they were mainly mentioned in Chinese chronicles, in which they were called Men-wu. It was about nomads who ate sour milk and meat and allowed themselves to raid the Celestial Empire, which at that time were absolutely unsuccessful. Taz-zun was conquered by the second emperor at the beginning of the 12th century. most Mongolia, his followers limited themselves to defensive wars with these people.

After the formation of the Mongolian state by Khabul Khan, who was the ancestor of Genghis Khan, all Mongolian tribes were united. Initially, they were considered vassals of Emperor Xizong, but soon entered into hostilities with him. As a result of this war, a peace treaty was concluded; the Chinese sent an observer to Khabul Khan’s camp, but he was killed, which was the reason for the start of another war. This time, the Jin rulers sent the Tatars to fight the Mongols; Khabul Khan was unable to withstand another grueling campaign. He died without reaching his goal. Ambagai took power into his own hands.
However, at the time of the truce, he was treacherously captured by the Tatars and handed over to the Chinese authorities. The next khan Kutul, united with the Manchu rebels, again attacked the Celestial Empire, as a result of which the Chinese ceded the fortifications north of Kerulen, control over which was lost after the death of Kurulai of his four brothers in an internecine war. All these actions became the precondition for the battle near Lake Buyr-nur in 1161, where the Mongols lost to the combined forces of the Chinese and Tatars. This led to the restoration of Jin power in Mongolia.

Mongol migration

Initially, the Mongol tribes were not nomads, they were engaged in hunting and gathering in the Altai and Dzungaria regions, as well as on the plains south and north of the Gobi. Coming into contact with the nomadic tribes of Western Asia, they adopted their culture and gradually migrated to the steppe regions, where they took up cattle breeding and turned into the nation that is familiar to us today.

Turks

History of origin

Research on the origin of Turkic peoples, ethnicity, their cultural traditions, unfortunately, are still the most problematic for academic science.
The first historical mention of the Turks is found in Chinese acts on the exchange of goods of the great empire. Documents were kept with the formation of a confederation of nomads established at that time in the 6th century AD. e. Stretching along the entire Great Wall and reaching the Black Sea in the west, the empire is known to the Chinese as T "u Küe and to the Turks themselves as Gek Turk, which meant the Top of the Sky.

Some tribes roamed to hunt and raid their sedentary neighbors. It is believed that Mongolia is the ancestor of both the Turks and Mongols. These groups, completely different at first glance, peoples, in the process of development of civilization, mixed and intertwined. In the endless history of events, battles, wars, the rise and stagnation of powers, nations have converged and diverged, which is still manifested in the similarity of their linguistic groups.
Turk, as a term, was first recorded in chronicle sources in the second half of the 6th century, consolidated and later widely used.
Ancient authors and medieval researchers - Herodotus, Pliny, Ptolemy, the author of the 7th century Armenian geography Shirakatsi and many others - left their notes about the Turkic tribes and peoples.
The processes of assimilation and separation of individual nationalities and linguistic groups occurred constantly and always. The territory of Mongolia is an ideal starting point for the advancement of nomadic tribes in search of fresh pastures and for expanding their horizons in the exploration of uncharted territories with harsher nature and predatory fauna. To do this, the first Turks had to go through a long string of endless plains and fields, open steppes, stretching all the way to Europe. Naturally, horsemen could move much faster across the steppes. In the places of their usual stops, to the south of such a nomadic road, entire settlements of related tribes settled down and began to live in rich communities. They formed strong communities among themselves.

The arrival of the Turks from the territory of the modern Mongolian plains was a very long process on a historical scale. This period of time has not yet been fully studied. Each successive wave of raids or invasions marks its appearance in historical chronicles only when Turkic tribes or famous warriors seize power in various regions completely alien to them. This could have happened together with the Khazars, Seljuks, or with one of the numerous, for that time, nomadic groups.
Certain evidence of the discoveries of scientists provides material for the assumption that the Volga-Ural interfluve is the ancestral home of the Turkic people. This includes the regions of Altai, Southern Siberia and the Baikal region. Perhaps this was their second ancestral home, from where they began their movement to Europe and Western Asia.
The ethnogenesis of the entire Turkic community boils down to the fact that the main ancestors of the Turks in the first ten centuries of our era began their existence in the east, in the territory between modern Altai and Baikal.
Historically, the Turks are not one single ethnic group. They consist of related and assimilated peoples of Eurasia. Although the entire diverse community is nevertheless a single ethnocultural whole Turkic people.

Religion Data

Before the adoption of the main world religions - Islam, Buddhism and partly Christianity, the Turkic peoples had and remain the first religious basis - the worship of Heaven - Tengri, the Creator. In everyday life, Tengri is synonymous with Allah.
This ancient original religion of Tengrism is recorded in Manchu missals and Chinese chronicles, Arabic, Iranian sources, and in fragments of preserved ancient Turkic runic monuments of the 6th-10th centuries. This is a completely original doctrine, has a complete conceptual form with the doctrine of a single deity, the concept of three worlds, mythology and demonology. The Turkic religion has many cult rituals.
Tengrism, as a fully formed religion, through a system of spiritual values ​​and codes, cultivated certain stable ethnic concepts of nomadic peoples.
Islam determines the entire worldview of the Turks, which recreates the history of their ancestors and the richness of Muslim culture. However, Islam received a certain Turkic interpretation based on the application of all the cultural traditions of Tengrism. This is expressed in the peculiarities of the ethnic worldview and human perception of the world, as the acceptance of the factor of coexistence with spiritualized nature.
One of the most important forms of Turkic art, besides painting and poetry, is the narration of epics in a falsetto voice accompanied by string instrument topsur (topshur), similar to a lute. Lyrics were typically delivered in a low bass register.
These stories were very popular among the inhabitants of the steppe. One of the legendary storytellers, Delhi, knew 77 of them by heart. And the longest story took seven days and nights.
The history of the Turkic ethnic group and the development of the language group begins with the Orkhon-Yenisei monument, which is still considered the most ancient monument of all Turkic languages ​​and dialects.
The latest scientific data say that the Scythian ethnoculture of the animal style, with its sources and roots, is closely intertwined with the Turkic-speaking peoples of Siberia and Altai.

Social structure

The accelerated development of processes of social and territorial consolidation led to the creation by Turkic-speaking peoples and tribes of a number of state entities - kaganates in the 2nd half of the 1st millennium. This form of political creation of the structure of society marked the process of formation of classes among nomads.
The constant migration of the population led to a unique socio-political structure of society - the Western Turkic Kaganate - this is a unified system based on nomadic and semi-nomadic farming and sedentary farming.
In the lands conquered by the Turks, the governorship of the kagan, the supreme figure, was established. He controlled the collection of taxes and the transfer of tribute to the Kagan capital. In the Kaganate there was a constant process of formation of classes and feudal social relations early period. The military-political resources of the power of the Western Turkic Kaganate were not strong enough to maintain different nations and tribes in constant obedience. Continuous civil strife, rapid and frequent changes of rulers are a constant process in society, which was accompanied by the inevitable weakening of public power and the fall of the Kaganate in the 8th century.

Wars of the Turks with other nations

The history of the Turkic people is a history of wars, migrations and relocations. The social structure of society directly depended on the success of battles and the outcome of battles. The long and brutal wars of the Turks with various nomadic tribes and sedentary peoples contributed to the formation of new nationalities and the formation of states.
Having secured the support of the rulers, the Turks established diplomatic relations with various North Chinese states and large tribes. Creating and gathering large armies in the Danube valley, under the leadership of the ruler of the Khaganate, the Turks more than once devastated the countries of Europe.
During the period of greatest territorial expansion, the Turkic Khaganate extended from Manchuria to the Kerch Strait, and from the Yenisei to the Amu Darya. The Great Chinese Empire, in constant wars for territory, divided the Kaganate into two main parts, which subsequently led to its complete collapse.

Migrations

Based on anthropological external characteristics, the Turks can be distinguished as Caucasian and Mongoloid. But the most common type is the transitional one, which belongs to the Turanian or South Siberian race.
Turkic peoples were hunters and nomadic shepherds, caring for sheep, horses and sometimes camels. In extremely preserved interesting culture there are basic characteristics that were laid down with early beginnings and are fully supported to this day.
The Volga-Ural region had all the favorable natural conditions for the rapid development of the ethnic group that inhabited it, especially the steppe and forest-steppe zones. Expanses of excellent pastures for livestock, forests, rivers and lakes, mineral deposits.
This region was one of the possible places where people, starting from the 3rd millennium BC, began to domesticate wild animals for the first time. The accelerated development of the Volga-Ural region was also facilitated by the geographic factor of the region's location at the junction of Europe and Asia. Numerous tribes passed through it in all directions. It was here that various ethnic groups mixed, which were the distant ancestors of the Turkic, Finnish, Ugric and other peoples. The area was densely populated during the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods. The entire cultural mosaic was formed in it, various traditions were intertwined and consolidated. The region itself was a contact zone of various cultural movements. According to archaeologists, return migrations of tribes from this area also had an important impact on the development of civilization. Based on the size of the settlements, we can conclude that the settlers lived a mobile, nomadic life. They lived in huts, caves or small insulated half-dugouts, which vaguely resemble later yurts.

Vast spaces contributed to large movements and migrations of large groups of pastoralists, which facilitated the process of mixing and assimilation with ancient tribes. In addition, such a nomadic image made it possible to quickly spread the economic and cultural achievements of pastoral tribes, nationalities and ordinary people from other areas with which they interacted. And that is why the identification of the first Turkic people also marked the stage of large-scale development of steppe spaces, the development and spread of productive forms of economy on it - livestock breeding and the development of nomadic forms of farming.
On such a vast territory, the social culture of the nomadic Turks could not remain unshakable and uniform; it was modified according to migration, mutually enriched by the achievements of foreign tribal groups.
These first settlements of the Turks were soon followed by a mysterious and powerful wave of conquest, which, according to researchers, was Turkic in origin - the Khazar Empire, which occupied the entire western part of the territory of the Gek Turk. The Khazars surprise their contemporaries and chroniclers with stories of amazing political intrigues that transformed en masse into Judaism in the 8th century.

Hello, dear readers – seekers of knowledge and truth!

It took hundreds of years of world history for the peoples inhabiting the Earth to settle where they live now, but even today not all people lead a sedentary lifestyle. In today's article we want to tell you about who nomads are.

Who can be called nomads, what they do, what peoples belong to them - you will learn all this below. We will also show how nomads live using the example of the life of one of the most famous nomadic peoples - the Mongolians.

Nomads – who are they?

Thousands of years ago, the territory of Europe and Asia was not dotted with cities and villages; entire tribes of people moved from place to place in search of fertile lands favorable for life.

Gradually, peoples settled in certain areas near water bodies, forming settlements that were later united into states. However, some peoples, especially the ancient steppe ones, continued to constantly change their place of residence, remaining nomads.

The word “nomad” comes from the Turkic “kosh”, which means “village along the road”. In the Russian language there are the concepts of “koshevoy ataman”, as well as “Cossack”, which, according to etymology, are considered related to him.

By definition, nomads are people who, together with their herd, moved from one place to another several times a year in search of food, water, and fertile lands. They do not have a permanent residence, a specific route, or statehood. People formed an ethnos, people or tribe of several families, headed by a leader.

An interesting fact was revealed during research - the birth rate among nomads is lower compared to sedentary peoples.

The main occupation of nomads is animal husbandry. Their means of subsistence are animals: camels, yaks, goats, horses, cattle. They all ate pasture, that is, grass, so almost every season the people had to leave the site for a new territory in order to find another, more fertile pasture and improve the well-being of the tribe as a whole.

If we talk about what the nomads did, their activity is not limited to raising livestock. They were also:

• farmers;
• artisans;
• traders;
• hunters;
• gatherers;
• fishermen;
• hired workers;
• warriors;
• robbers.

Nomads often launched raids on settled livestock breeders, trying to win back “tidbits” of land from them. Interestingly, they won quite often because they were more physically resilient due to harsher living conditions. Many major conquerors: the Mongol-Tatars, Scythians, Aryans, Sarmatians were among them.

Some nationalities, for example the gypsies, made a living from the arts of theater, music, and dance.

Great Russian scientist Leo Gumilyov - orientalist, historian, ethnologist and son of poets Nikolai Gumilyov and Anna Akhmatova - studied the life of nomadic ethnicgroupsand wrote a treatise “Climate Change and Nomadic Migration.”

Peoples

In terms of geography, several large nomadic areas can be distinguished around the world:

• Middle Eastern tribes breeding horses, camels, donkeys - Kurds, Pashtuns, Bakhtiars;
• desert Arab territories, including the Sahara, where camels are mainly used - Bedouins, Tuaregs;
• East African savannas - Masai, Dinka;
• highlands of Asia - Tibetan, Pamir territories, as well as the South American Andes;
• aborigines of Australia;
• northern peoples who breed deer - Chukchi, Evenki;
• steppe peoples of Central Asia - Mongols, Turks and other representatives of the Altai language group.

The latter are the most numerous and are of the greatest interest, if only because some of them have retained a nomadic lifestyle. These included peoples who showed their power: the Huns, Turks, Mongols, Chinese dynasties, Manchus, Persians, Scythians, predecessors of the modern Japanese.

Chinese yuan - the currency of the Celestial Empire - is so named thanks to nomads of the Yuan clan.

They also included:

• Kazakhs;
• Kyrgyz;
• Tuvans;
• Buryats;
• Kalmyks;
• Avars;
• Uzbeks.

Eastern peoples were forced to survive in harsh conditions: open winds, dry summers, severe frosts in the winter, snowstorms. As a result, the lands were infertile, and even the sprouted crop could be destroyed by weather conditions, so people mainly raised animals.

Nomads of modern times

Today, Asian nomads are concentrated mainly in Tibet and Mongolia. A revival of nomadism was noticed after the collapse of the USSR in the former Soviet republics, but now this process is fading away.

The thing is that this is unprofitable for the state: it is difficult to control the movements of people, as well as to receive tax revenues. Nomads, constantly changing their location, occupy large territories, which are economically more expedient to turn into agricultural land.

In the modern world, the concept of “neo-nomads” or “nomads” has become popular. It denotes people who are not tied to a specific job, city or even country and travel, changing their place of residence several times a year. These usually include actors, politicians, guest workers, athletes, seasonal workers, and freelancers.

Occupation and life of the nomads of Mongolia

Most modern Mongols living outside the city live traditionally, just like their ancestors did several centuries ago. Their main activity is animal husbandry.

Because of this, they move twice every year - in summer and winter. In winter, people settle in high mountain valleys, where they build pens for livestock. In summer they descend lower, where there is more space and enough pasture.

Modern residents of Mongolia usually do not go beyond the boundaries of one region in their movements. The concept of a tribe has also lost its significance; decisions are mainly made at family meetings, although the main ones are also approached for advice. People live in small groups of several families, settling close to each other.

There are twenty times more domestic animals than people in Mongolia.

Domestic animals include sheep, bulls, large and small cattle. A small community often gathers a whole herd of horses. A camel is a kind of transport.

Sheep are bred not only for their meat, but also for their wool. The Mongols learned to make thin, thick, white, and dark yarn. Coarse is used for the construction of traditional houses, carpets. More delicate things are made from thin light threads: hats, clothes.

Warm clothes are made from leather, fur, and wool material. Household items such as dishes or utensils should not be fragile due to constant movement, so they are made from wood or even leather.

Families living near mountains, forests or reservoirs are also engaged in crop production, fishing, and hunting. Hunters go with dogs to hunt mountain goats, wild boars, and deer.

Housing

The Mongolian house, as you may already know from our previous articles, is called.

The majority of the population lives in them.

Even in the capital, Ulaanbaatar, where new buildings rise, there are entire neighborhoods with hundreds of yurts on the outskirts.

The dwelling consists of a wooden frame, which is covered with felt. Thanks to this design, the dwellings are light, almost weightless, so they are convenient to transport from one place to another, and in a couple of hours three people can easily disassemble and reassemble it.

On the left in the yurt is the men's part - the owner of the house lives here and tools for raising animals and hunting, for example, a horse cart and weapons, are stored. Right – female part, where kitchen utensils, cleaning supplies, dishes, and children’s things are located.

In the center is the hearth - the main place in the house. Above it there is a hole from where the smoke comes out, which is also the only window. On a sunny day, the door is usually left open to allow more light into the yurt.

Opposite the entrance there is a kind of living room where it is customary to welcome honored guests. Along the perimeter there are beds, wardrobes, and cabinets for family members.

You can often find televisions and computers in homes. Usually there is no electricity here, but today solar panels are used to solve this problem. There is also no running water, and all amenities are located on the street.

Traditions

Anyone who has had the chance to get to know the Mongols closely will note their incredible hospitality, patience, hardy and unpretentious character. These features were also reflected in folk art, which is represented mainly by an epic glorifying heroes.

Many traditions in Mongolia are associated with Buddhist culture, where many rituals originate. Shamanic rituals are also common here.

Residents of Mongolia are superstitious by nature, so their life is woven from a series of protective rituals. They especially try to protect children from evil spirits using, for example, special names or clothes.

Mongolians love to escape from everyday life during the holidays. An event that people wait for all year is Tsagan Sar, the Buddhist New Year. You can read about how it is celebrated in Mongolia.

Another major holiday that lasts more than one day is Nadom. This is a kind of festival during which different games, competitions, archery competitions, horse racing.

Conclusion

To summarize, we note once again that nomads are peoples who seasonally change their place of residence. They are mainly engaged in breeding large and small livestock, which explains their constant movements.

In history, there have been many nomadic groups on almost all continents. The most famous nomads of our time are the Mongols, whose life has changed little over several centuries. They still live in yurts, raise livestock, and move within the country in summer and winter.

Thank you very much for your attention, dear readers! We hope that you found answers to your questions and were able to learn better about the life of modern nomads.

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Nomad

All about nomads

A nomad (from Greek: νομάς, nomas, plural νομάδες, nomades, which means: one who wanders in search of pastures and belongs to the tribe of shepherds) is a member of a community of people who live in different territories, moving from place to place . Depending on the attitude towards environment The following types of nomads are distinguished: hunter-gatherers, nomadic pastoralists raising livestock, as well as “modern” nomadic wanderers. As of 1995, there were 30-40 million nomads in the world.

Hunting wild animals and gathering seasonal plants is the oldest method of human survival. Nomadic pastoralists raised livestock by moving them and/or moving with them in order to avoid irreversible depletion of pastures.

The nomadic lifestyle is also most suitable for inhabitants of the tundra, steppes, sandy or ice-covered regions, where constant movement is the most effective strategy for using limited natural resources. For example, many settlements in the tundra consist of reindeer herders who lead a semi-nomadic lifestyle in search of food for the animals. These nomads sometimes resort to high technology, such as solar panels, to reduce their dependence on diesel fuel.

“Nomadic” is also sometimes called various wandering peoples who migrate through densely populated areas, but not in search of natural resources, but by providing services (crafts and trade) to the permanent population. These groups are known as "nomadic wanderers."

Who are nomads?

A nomad is a person who does not have permanent housing. A nomad moves from place to place in search of food, pasture for livestock, or otherwise making a living. The word Nomadd comes from a Greek word that means a person who wanders in search of pastures. The movements and settlements of most nomadic groups have a certain seasonal or annual character. Nomadic peoples usually travel by animal, canoe or on foot. Nowadays, some nomads use motorized vehicles. Most nomads live in tents or other mobile homes.

Nomads continue to move for various reasons. Nomadic foragers move in search of game, edible plants and water. Australian Aborigines, Southeast Asian Negritos and African Bushmen, for example, move from camp to camp to hunt and gather wild plants. Some tribes of North and South America also led this way of life. Nomadic pastoralists make their living by raising animals such as camels, cattle, goats, horses, sheep and yaks. These nomads travel the deserts of Arabia and North Africa in search of camels, goats and sheep. Members of the Fulani tribe travel with their cattle through the grasslands along the Niger River in West Africa. Some nomads, especially pastoralists, may also move to raid settled communities or to avoid enemies. Nomadic artisans and traders travel to find customers and provide services. These include representatives of the Lohar tribe of Indian blacksmiths, gypsy traders and Irish "travelers".

Nomadic lifestyle

Most nomads travel in groups or tribes, which are made up of families. These groups are based on kinship and marriage ties or formal cooperation agreements. A council of adult men makes most decisions, although some tribes are led by chiefs.

In the case of Mongolian nomads, the family moves twice a year. These migrations usually occur during the summer and winter periods. In winter, they are located in mountain valleys, where most families have permanent winter camps, on the territory of which pens for animals are equipped. Other families do not use these sites in the absence of the owners. In summer, nomads move to more open areas to graze animals. Most nomads tend to move within one region without venturing too far. In this way, communities and families belonging to the same group are formed; as a rule, community members know approximately the location of neighboring groups. More often than not, one family does not have enough resources to migrate from one area to another, unless they leave a certain area permanently. Single family can move on its own or together with others, and even if a family moves alone, the distance between their settlements is no more than a couple of kilometers. Today, the Mongols do not have the concept of a tribe and decisions are made in family councils, although the opinions of elders are also listened to. Families settle close to each other for the purpose of mutual support. The number of communities of nomadic pastoralists is usually not large. On the basis of one of these Mongol communities, the largest land empire in history arose. The Mongol people originally consisted of a number of loosely organized nomadic tribes from Mongolia, Manchuria and Siberia. At the end of the 12th century, Genghis Khan united them with other nomadic tribes to found the Mongol Empire, whose power eventually extended throughout Asia.

The nomadic lifestyle is becoming increasingly rare. Many governments have a negative attitude towards nomads, as it is difficult to control their movements and collect taxes from them. Many countries have converted grasslands into farmland and forced nomadic peoples to abandon their permanent settlements.

Hunter-gatherers

"Nomadic" hunter-gatherers (also known as foragers) move from camp to camp in search of wild animals, fruits and vegetables. Hunting and gathering is ancient ways, with the help of which man provided himself with the means of subsistence, and all modern people about 10,000 years ago belonged to hunter-gatherers.

Following the development of agriculture, most hunter-gatherers were eventually either displaced or turned into groups of farmers or herders. Few modern societies are classified as hunter-gatherers, and some combine, sometimes quite extensively, foraging activities with agriculture and/or animal breeding.

Nomadic pastoralists

Pastoral nomads are nomads who move between pastures. There are three stages in the development of nomadic cattle breeding, which accompanied population growth and the complication of the social structure of society. Karim Sadr proposed the following steps:

• Cattle breeding: a mixed type of economy with intra-family symbiosis.
• Agro-pastoralism: Defined as a symbiosis between segments or clans within an ethnic group.

True nomadism: represents a symbiosis at the regional level, usually between nomadic and agricultural populations.

Pastoralists are tied to a specific territory as they move between permanent spring, summer, autumn and winter livestock pastures. Nomads move depending on the availability of resources.

How and why did nomads appear?

The development of nomadic pastoralism is considered part of the secondary products revolution proposed by Andrew Sherratt. During this revolution, the early pre-Pottery Neolithic cultures, for whom animals were live meat ("slaughtered"), also began to use them for secondary products, such as milk, milk products, wool, hides, manure for fuel and fertilizers, and as draft power.

The first nomadic pastoralists appeared in the period from 8,500-6,500 BC. in the southern Levant area. There, during a period of increasing drought, the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) culture in Sinai was replaced by a nomadic pottery-pastoral culture, which was the result of a merger with Mesolithic people who arrived from Egypt (Kharifian culture) and adapted a nomadic hunting lifestyle to animal husbandry.

This way of life quickly evolved into what Juris Zarins called the nomadic pastoral complex in Arabia, and what is possibly associated with the emergence of Semitic languages ​​in the ancient Near East. The rapid spread of nomadic cattle breeding was characteristic of such later formations as the Yamnaya culture, the nomadic pastoralists of the Eurasian steppes, as well as the Mongols in the late Middle Ages.

Beginning in the 17th century, nomadism spread among the Trekboer people of southern Africa.

Nomadic pastoralism in Central Asia

One of the consequences of the collapse Soviet Union and the subsequent political independence, as well as the economic decline of the Central Asian republics that were part of it, there was a revival of nomadic pastoralism. A striking example is the Kyrgyz people, who had nomadism as the center of their economic life until Russian colonization at the turn of the 20th century, which forced them to settle down and take up farming in villages. In the period after World War II, a process of intensive urbanization of the population began, but some people continued to move their herds of horses and cows to high mountain pastures (jailoo) every summer, following the pattern of transhumance.

As a result of the contraction of the cash economy since the 1990s, unemployed relatives returned to family farms. Thus, the importance of this form of nomadism has increased significantly. Nomadic symbols, particularly the crown of a gray felt tent known as a yurt, appear on the national flag, emphasizing the centrality of the nomadic lifestyle to the modern life of the people of Kyrgyzstan.

Nomadic pastoralism in Iran

In 1920, nomadic pastoral tribes made up more than a quarter of Iran's population. During the 1960s, tribal grazing lands were nationalized. According to the National Commission of UNESCO, the population of Iran in 1963 was 21 million people, of which two million (9.5%) were nomads. Despite the fact that the number of nomadic populations declined sharply in the 20th century, Iran still occupies one of the leading positions in the number of nomadic populations in the world. The country of 70 million people is home to about 1.5 million nomads.

Nomadic pastoralism in Kazakhstan

In Kazakhstan, where nomadic pastoralism was the basis of agricultural activity, the process of forced collectivization under the leadership of Joseph Stalin was met with massive resistance, which led to large losses and confiscation of livestock. The number of large horned animals in Kazakhstan decreased from 7 million heads to 1.6 million, and out of 22 million sheep, 1.7 million remained. As a result of this, about 1.5 million people died from the famine of 1931-1934, which is more than 40 % of the total Kazakh population at that time.

Transition from nomadic to sedentary lifestyle

In the 1950s and 60s, as a result of shrinking territory and population growth, large numbers of Bedouins from all over the Middle East began to abandon their traditional nomadic lifestyle and settle in cities. Government policies in Egypt and Israel, oil production in Libya and the Persian Gulf, and the desire to improve living standards have led to the fact that most Bedouins have become settled citizens of various countries, abandoning nomadic pastoralism. A century later, the nomadic Bedouin population still made up about 10% of the Arab population. Today this figure has dropped to 1% of the total population.

At the time of independence in 1960, Mauritania was a nomadic society. The Great Sahel Drought of the early 1970s caused widespread problems in a country where nomadic pastoralists made up 85% of the inhabitants. Today, only 15% remain nomads.

In the period before the Soviet invasion, as many as 2 million nomads moved throughout Afghanistan. Experts say that by 2000 their numbers had dropped sharply, probably by half. In some regions, severe drought has destroyed up to 80% of livestock.

Niger experienced a severe food crisis in 2005 as a result of irregular rainfall and desert locust infestations. The nomadic Tuareg and Fulani ethnic groups, who make up about 20% of Niger's 12.9 million population, have been hit so hard by the food crisis that their already precarious way of life is under threat. The crisis has also affected the lives of the nomadic peoples of Mali.

Nomadic minorities

"Itinerant minorities" are mobile groups of people moving among settled populations offering craft services or engaging in trade.

Each existing community is largely endogamous, traditionally subsisting on trade and/or service provision. Previously, all or most of their members led a nomadic lifestyle, which continues to this day. Migration, in our time, usually occurs within the political boundaries of one state.

Each of the mobile communities is multilingual; members of the group speak one or more languages ​​spoken by the local settled inhabitants, and in addition, each group has a distinct dialect or language. The latter are of either Indian or Iranian origin, and many of them are an argot or secret language, the vocabulary of which is derived from various languages. There is evidence that in northern Iran, at least one community speaks a Romani language, which is also used by some groups in Turkey.

What do nomads do?

In Afghanistan, the Nausars worked as shoemakers and traded animals. The men of the Gorbat tribe were engaged in the manufacture of sieves, drums, bird cages, and their women traded in these products, as well as other household and personal items; they also acted as moneylenders for rural women. Men and women of other ethnic groups such as Jalali, Pikrai, Shadibaz, Noristani and Wangawala were also involved in trading various goods. Representatives of the Wangawala and Pikrai groups traded animals. Some men among the shadibazas and vangawalas entertained the spectators by demonstrating trained monkeys or bears and charming snakes. The Baloch men and women included musicians and dancers, and Baloch women also engaged in prostitution. Men and women of the Yogi people engaged in various activities, such as breeding and selling horses, harvesting crops, fortune telling, bloodletting and begging.

In Iran, representatives of the Ashek ethnic groups from Azerbaijan, the Halli from Baluchistan, the Luti from Kurdistan, Kermanshah, Ilam and Lurestan, the Mekhtars from the Mamasani region, the Sazandehs from Band Amir and Marw Dasht, and the Toshmali from the Bakhtiari pastoral groups worked as professional musicians. Men from the Kuvli group worked as shoemakers, blacksmiths, musicians, and trainers of monkeys and bears; they also made baskets, sieves, brooms and traded donkeys. Their women earned money by trading, begging and fortune telling.

Gorbats from the Basseri tribe worked as blacksmiths and shoemakers, traded in pack animals, made sieves, reed mats and small wooden tools. It was reported that members of the Qarbalbanda, Coolie and Luli groups from the Fars region worked as blacksmiths, making baskets and sieves; they also traded in pack animals, and their women traded various goods among the nomadic pastoralists. In the same region, the Changi and Luti were musicians and singers of ballads, and children were taught these professions from the age of 7 or 8.

Representatives of nomadic ethnic groups in Turkey make and sell cradles, trade animals and play musical instruments. Men from sedentary groups work in the cities as scavengers and executioners; they earn extra money as fishermen, blacksmiths, singers and basket weavers; their women dance at feasts and practice fortune-telling. Men from the Abdal group (“bards”) earn money by playing musical instruments, making sieves, brooms and wooden spoons. Tahtacı ("woodcutters") are traditionally engaged in wood processing; As a result of greater sedentary lifestyles, some also took up farming and gardening.

Little is known about the past of these communities; the history of each group is almost entirely contained in their oral tradition. Although some groups, such as the Wangawala, are of Indian origin, some, such as the Noristani, are most likely of local origin, while the spread of others is thought to be the result of migration from neighboring areas. The Ghorbat and Shadibaz groups originally came from Iran and Multan, respectively, and the Tahtacı ("woodcutters") group is traditionally considered to have originated in Baghdad or Khorasan. The Baloch claim that they treated the Jamshedis as servants after they fled Balochistan due to civil strife.

Yuryuk nomads

Yuryuks are nomads who live in Turkey. Some groups such as the Sarıkeçililer still lead a nomadic life between the coastal cities of the Mediterranean and the Taurus Mountains, although most were forced to settle during the late Ottoman and Turkish republics.

Despite the fact that the formation of nomadic, semi-nomadic and sedentary types of economy in Kazakhstan goes back to the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. e. and the development of these types of economy in different climatic conditions occurred simultaneously, although at different rates and never stopped, the Kazakhs, by inertia, continue to be considered typical nomads who had nothing to do with sedentism, agriculture, and especially urban civilization. At the same time, it does not take into account the fact that the basis for the formation, even the existence of three Kazakh zhuzes - senior, middle and junior, was also one or another oasis where there were cities, settled agricultural settlements, the inhabitants of which were engaged not only in trade and crafts affairs, but also cattle breeding, irrigated agriculture, even if unproductive. The pastoralists of the steppes and the farmers of the neighboring oases were not always and not necessarily ethnically different populations. Throughout history, as part of the same nomadic people or tribal association, some part of it was semi-nomadic and even sedentary. “Elements of sedentary life and agriculture always accompany nomadic pastoralism,” scientists prove. Having their relatives on the banks of the Syr Darya, in the valleys of Talas, Keles, Arys, Chirchik, and the basin of the famous seven rivers - Dzhetysu, nomadic pastoralists maintained regular and fairly strong economic ties with them, as evidenced by the results of excavations at Otrar and other medieval settlements. In exchange for rams, horses, camels, wool, furs, skins, skins, the nomads received bread in the oases, which, along with meat and dairy products, formed the basis of their food, as well as fabric, dishes, and weapons. The population of the oases, which received the necessary products from the steppes, was also interested in such contacts.

History knows many examples of how the Kazakhs more than once repelled the onslaught of Central Asian rulers, who always sought to take possession of the Turkestan (Syr Darya) cities, which include Sygnak, Sauran, Yasy (Turkestan), Suzak, Otrar, Sairam and others. “This area was extremely important for the Kazakh khans, leaders nomadic Uzbeks, the rulers of Mogulistan and Transoxiana both economically, being an area of ​​developed agriculture, beautiful winter pastures, crafts and trade, and military-strategically. There was an ongoing struggle between them for dominance over this area throughout the 16th century.

The cities of Turkestan passed from hand to hand. Only towards the end of the century the region of the middle reaches of the Syr Darya became part of the Kazakh Khanate.” From about this time until the first quarter of the 18th century, that is, before the invasion of the Dzungars, these cities were subordinate to the Kazakh rulers, who, relying on their fellow tribesmen as a military force, felt themselves to be the absolute masters of this region and received considerable income from the urban trade and craft population and surrounding dikhans (farmers) - farmers in the form of taxes and duties. Therefore, when assessing the economy of the Kazakhs of the past, it is obviously necessary to proceed from what form of it prevailed in a particular region and in what proportions it was combined with others. In the steppes of Sary-Arka (literally from ancient Turkic - “yellow distances”), for example, Kazakhs bred in large quantities sheep, horses, camels, which were kept on pasture and constantly needed to change pastures. Due to this circumstance, large livestock owners were forced to migrate over long distances, while the relatively small-scale steppe inhabitants only had to travel for one, two or three days to survive on short-range nomads.

At the same time, both of them willingly exploited the labor of the Zhatak - the most disadvantaged part of the steppe population of the late Middle Ages, forced to settle for lack of their own livestock. Zhataki, literally “lying”, were engaged in the construction and repair of winter camps - kystau, with their residential and outbuildings, harvesting hay for Bai cattle, which was not always enough for the winter, primitive farming in river backwaters, around fresh lakes. The entire wealth of the Jatak consisted, as a rule, of one or two dairy cows, a camel and a horse for draft power. He had almost no sheep or goats. “A nomadic steppe dweller eats, drinks and dresses in cattle,” Chokan Valikhanov once wrote, “for him, cattle is more valuable than his peace of mind. The first greeting of a Kyrgyz, as we know, begins with the following phrase: “Are your cattle and your family healthy?” This care with which one inquires about the cattle in advance characterizes (it) more than entire pages (of descriptions).” And the well-being of livestock - the main wealth of the steppe inhabitants - depended entirely on natural conditions, in accordance with which seasonal pastures historically developed. The northern forest-steppe and southeastern mountainous regions of Kazakhstan, where significant amounts of precipitation fell, were used mainly for summer pastures - dzhailyau (zhailau), while the eastern and central ones were used for winter pastures - kys-tau. But the spring - Kokteu and autumn - Kuzeu pastures were directly adjacent to the wintering areas. Seasonal pastures, although traditionally distributed among clans, were, with the exception of winter ones, for common use. Kazakhs are characterized by all types of nomadism known in history - the so-called “meridianal”, “vertical”, “wintering”, determined primarily by the number of livestock on farms, the natural and climatic conditions in which certain groups of nomadic herders were located.

Kyrgyz- V in this case We are talking about Kazakhs. In connection with the annexation of Kazakhstan to Russia, Europeans began to call the Kazakhs “Kyrgyz-Cossacks” or “Kyrgyz-Kaysaks”, so as not to confuse them with the Russian Cossacks, as well as the Tien Shan Kirghiz, known in history as the Kara-Kirghiz, taking into account the latter’s affinity for the Kazakhs language, culture and way of life.

Moreover, both nomads and semi-nomads had their own separate winter camps, with protected areas for grazing young and weak animals. They were called koryk or koi bolik. More independent cattle owners also had spare wintering quarters - kelte kystau, zhalgan kora and part of their livestock were kept in stalls in the winter. The summer nomads of the Kazakhs of the Middle and Junior Zhuzes were in the forest-steppe and steppe zone of Sary-Arka, the winter ones - in the floodplains of the Syr Darya, the lower reaches of the Chu, at the foot of the Karatau, in the Aral Sea region, and on Mangyshlak. In early spring, following the advancing warmth, the nomads began to move north. The Kazakhs of the southern part of the Sary-Arka steppes, who not only in summer but also in winter led a nomadic life in the lower reaches of the Chu, walked only in one direction up to a thousand kilometers from the Chu River, through Betpak-Dala, the Ulytau Mountains to the present Atbasar. The nomadic population of the right bank of the Syr Darya moved north through the Karakum, Ainakul to Turgai and further to Kustanai. From the Ustyurt and Mangyshlak plateaus, the lower reaches of the Urals, the banks of Uyul, Sagyz, Irgiz, where there was a lack of summer pastures, people migrated over the summer to the boundaries of the present-day Ural, Aktobe and Kustanai regions, covering more than a thousand kilometers in one direction. However, many farms moved within their ancestral lands. And low-capacity farms or impoverished populations remained in winter camps. The number of such farms at the beginning of the 20th century. was quite large even in such purely nomadic pastoral areas as Mangyshlak and Ustyurt, the lower reaches of the Syr Darya. Thus, numerous herds of cattle of the Kazakhs of the middle and junior zhuzes were in the Ishim, Turgai, Tobolsk, Ural and Aktobe pastures in the summer. And with the approach of autumn, following the retreating heat, they moved back to the south, to their wintering places. The routes of such migrations were regulated primarily by the location of water sources.

They usually roamed in an aul - a mobile village connected by family ties or economic benefits, adhering to the same tracts and wells in order to avoid clashes with neighbors. In tracts with an abundance of grass and a good watering hole, the aul was located for several days, and if conditions permitted, even more. In deserted deserts with sparse grass, stops were reduced to 2-3 days. This type of nomadism among the Kazakhs is considered to be “meridian”, i.e. from south to north and from north to south. For the Kazakhs of the senior zhuz, the foothills and mountains of Altai, Tarbagatai, Dzungarian, Trans-Ili and Talas Alatau served as summer nomads. They usually wintered in the sands of Moiynkum, Sary-Ishik-Atrau, mountain valleys protected from cold winds, wherever there was not much snow and livestock could get food. In the spring, gradually rising into the mountains, the nomads brought their herds to the alpine meadows, where the cattle remained all summer. By autumn, all the herds were brought down again. This is the so-called. “vertical” nomadism, with its somewhat less extended transitions compared to “meridian” ones. The third, the so-called “wintering” (stationary) nomadism, was typical for the arid regions of southern Kazakhstan. Nomadic herders spent the winter in villages located in areas of irrigated agriculture, where their estates were located with a small supply of hay so that they could keep a small number of livestock with them. And the main herds wintered in tugai, reed thickets of the floodplain of the Syr Darya, Talas, Chu, where the animals could obtain food themselves. In the spring, wealthier pastoralists traveled with their herds short distances on both sides of the Syr Darya, along the Karatau ridge, Talas Alatau, Ugam, settling for the summer near lakes and wells, and returning to winter lands in late autumn. The distance to the summer camps was within 40-50 kilometers.

All types of Kazakh nomadism were characterized by their own species composition of livestock. Under the “meridian” system of nomadism, the herd included many sheep, horses, camels, especially two-humped camels, capable of roaming, that is, independently obtaining food and enduring the difficulties of a long journey. Under the “vertical” system, cows were added to sheep and horses, and under the “wintering” system, both animals were added, but only in limited quantities. Consecutive movement across seasonal pastures was a single production process, in which migration acted as a stage of its closed annual cycle. Despite the difficulties of the transition, summer migrations are the best thing that a steppe dweller could experience in life, when livestock quickly gains weight on summer grazing, you can enjoy fresh meat, milk and kumiss, and spend a carefree few months in the clean air under the open sky. This is also the time for weddings, competitions in songs, agility, and strength. And therefore, the generous summer with its colorful journeys is sung in songs, the epic poem “Kyz-Zhibek” with all the colors of versification. In all likelihood, it was from those distant times that the Kazakhs retained the tradition of lovingly decorating a loaded camel with carpets, for which blankets with embroidery and all kinds of pendants were specially made. A caravan of loaded camels was usually led by a girl in a rich outfit on a pacer horse or on a leading camel - a bunk.

Kyz-Zhibek- Kazakh folk lyric-epic poem, named after the heroine. Translated, it means Silk Girl, Silk Girl. This work is a pearl of Kazakh folklore. The Kazakh “Romeo and Juliet” glorifies fidelity in love, friendship, courage and patriotism.

"The girl is alone again
Leads the caravan
And he leads
Thirty bunks - all yellow!
You haven't seen these yourself!
The copper of the muzzles is like heat,
Dried silk - reasons,
And under it the bunk itself -
More beautiful than all, mighty and fierce!
And herself, she herself -
Like the full moon
Like a silver carp
Played out in the water
She bends her flexible figure."

This is how the nomadic village of a rich village is described in the epic poem “Kyz-Zhibek”. However, as the colonial administration of tsarism confiscated the best lands from the Kazakhs, starting from the second half of the 19th century, the size of summer pastures from north to south gradually decreased, and in some places were reduced to zero, which led to a sharp change in traditional nomadic routes. But despite this, their main types persisted for a long time, only in different proportions and sizes.

Uzbekali Janibekov

Republic of Kazakhstan on the map